Today, when you order "The Red Envelope by David Sousa and Luis De Matos - DVD", you'll instantly be emailed a Penguin Magic gift certificate. You can spend it on anything you like at Penguin, just like cash. Just complete your order as normal, and within seconds you'll get an email with your gift certificate.

The Red Envelope is David Sousa's award-winning silent act. This act inspired a generation of world-class manipulators and champions and led to David being appointed Honorary Professor at the Academy of Magical Arts in South Korea.

In this themed act a red envelope appears, transforms and vanishes in the most astonishing manner. These incredible visual effects can be used in any stage act and the ingenious systems applied to develop more astounding productions, vanishes and transformations.

I got the chance to see David lecture live for the SAM here in Tucson, and wow was he fantastic.
He's a nice guy, very funny, and took the time to answer our questions, and showed us pretty much
every detail of this act, along with selling props for the act (except the billiard balls, confetti,
and one more thing that I cannot reveal). His way of thinking is genius and he makes every idea
simple and as easy to do as possible. He emphasized on points that many young magicians and some
older magicians miss which was helpful. He touches on those points on the DVD as well.

The
DVD is of amazing quality, and David's teaching is incredible and detailed. He hits on almost
everything you need to know for this beautiful act. The act itself is beautiful and flows very
nicely. I love how it incorporates canes, confetti, billiard ball, scarf, and different sizes of
decks, not just cards or just billiard balls. Be warned that this act will take a decent amount of
time to learn and perfect since it is manipulation. However, David's handling on many things will
make the act a lot less knuckle-busting than pretty much all of the Korean manipulation acts.

This DVD only comes with a deck of manipulation cards, as advertised. If you want to do the act
exactly like the trailer (almost the same way David did it at FISM), then you will need to buy
another roughly $300 dollars in material ($50 for the 2 billiard balls (I got the JL Mirage Billiard
Ball), $20 for the cane (I bought that from David), $10 for a force deck of Ace of Hearts, $5 for
the silk scarf, $10 for a small item that is used (got it from David), and another $75-150 for
another prop (or prop-like thing) depending on how nice you want it). I'm sorry I was not specific
on the last two things, but I cannot reveal it since it will reveal some secrets. Even though it
only comes with a deck of manipulation cards, this DVD is worth the price. His act is astonishing
and beautiful.

The manipulation cards are wonderful. They are very, very thin and fan
pretty well. The thin-ness of the cards make them easy to back palm and handle for manipulation
purposes. The back design is skin colored, which is an added bonus.

All in all, I highly
recommend this DVD. You will have to get additional items and they may be a bit pricey depending on
how nice you want your material, but I think it is worth every penny if you want an amazing
manipulation act in your repertoire. Even if you do not want a manipulation act, get this DVD for
David's thinking since his creativity and ideas are astonishing and genius. I can guarantee that
even if you do not do the manipulation act (I don't know why you wouldn't) that you can use some of
the methods and ideas from this act and this DVD in your other stage or everyday performance.